Chapter III

ON an evening in the middle of July, Mistress Jane Dormer was sitting alone after supper in a little dressing-room at Waltham Cross.

They had arrived a couple of hours earlier, riding over the rough, dusty roads from Norton; and the streets of the market-town were still noisy with the footsteps of men and horses seeking lodging, for the abbey would not hold them all.

A pleasant murmur came up, mixed with the pealing of bells, to this little shadowy room, for the window was flung wide to let in the soft summer air, cooling now after a hot day, and the western sunlight streamed in down from the hills a mile away, across the smoky roofs of the town, and fell on the new-hung walls within, the embroidered fountains and wreaths, and upon the girl icrself in her chair among the trunks. She was tired out, and her fair-skinned face and clear rave eyes showed it. There had been the ride; then the stress of unpacking and of dressing the Queen for supper, for Mary abated none of her magnificence even when she supped alone. Then Jane had supped herself, and gone out for a stroll with Lady Magdalene and a gentleman to attend them, but had found herself back again at the abbey ten minutes before the time fixed by her mistress.

She was anxious too about her mistress. It had been one of Mary's silent days; she had scarcely spoken all

The Queen's Tragedy day or at supper, except to bid her lady come in an hour's time; and Jane knew perfectly well what was troubling her mistress. It was one of those days on which the whole burden rested heavily; and from hints the night before Jane had recognised that it was imminent.

The girl leaned back sighing, and passed her hands behind her head and began to review the details.

First of all, the marriage, only a week or so away now. Opposition was not dead yet. Parliament had yielded, and the Spanish prince was on his way with his splendid escort across the long rollers of the West; but was not England silenced rather than persuaded?

Then there were fifty other signs of hostility. Jane had a sight now and again of the papers that poured in morning by morning, denouncing Mary, crying for her death, telling of the whisperers that gabbled and the fanatics that raved against the blood, the faith and the politics of their Queen.

She had seen Mary too again and again receive the news, month by month, of the Protestant outbreaks. There had been the menace at Colchester which Mary had treated with a strong hand; there had been the horrible outrage on Easter Day — the theft of the Sacred Host from the Sepulchre, and the sneers that followed it. " Surrexit! Non hie! " the priest had sung as he drew back the door. Folks had laughed and whispered as they repeated the tale. God was not there, they had sniggered. He was lost; but the priest could soon make Him again.

There had been the horror in April, when a cat had been hung on the Cheapside gallows, in mass-vestments and with a white disc elevated between the dead paws. At Corpus Christi a dagger had been drawn on the priest who bore the Sacrament in Smithfield; later, a shot

Mary the Queen takes a Husband had been fired at the preacher at Paul's Cross; and, last, there was the feigned miracle in Aldersgate — the affair of the girl who hid herself in the wall and cried out in a ghostly voice against the mass and the Queen, and the Spanish marriage and the increasing of idolatry.

Jane knew what these insults meant to Mary; she had heard her sobbing softly one night; she had seen her set face in the morning.

Yet that was not all. There was the misery of treason from Mary's own blood relations and friends. The Lady Elizabeth had not wanted for tenderness and love; she had been loaded with toys as a child, by Mary, and with jewels as a woman; and she repaid it — this thin tight-lipped pale creature — by treating her sister as a tyrant, by allowing herself to be used as a claimant to the throne, by denying the traitorous interviews with De Noailles' agents and the messages to Courtenay, by flinging herself down, all in white as a virgin-martyr, crying to God to strike her dead if she were untrue, and to Mary to forgive and trust her — Mary who knew her as false.

It was a miserable affair, thought Jane. The Princess had been sent to the Tower at last; and there too she had posed and ranted, crying out at the Traitor's Gate, and passing through to her lodgings in a dramatic, agonised silence. All that had proved useless too; Mary had tried tenderness again, had told her of her refusal to listen to Renard's demand for her life, and had sent her home to Richmond. There too there had been treachery; clear proofs of collusion between the Princess and De Noailles; and now Elizabeth was once more at Woodstock, a piteous martyr in public, and a discreet schemer in private. Was loyalty an impossible lesson for Anne Boleyn's daughter to learn?

The Queen's Tragedy

Mistress Dormer sighed and sat up. It was nearly time to go to the Queen.

She knew well that in Mary's opinion there was but one hope, and that the Spanish marriage.

Jane had listened to a passion of enthusiasm a week before, as to what the marriage would do. Philip would be with her then, the Queen had cried, and all Spain behind him; a flood of Catholic life would pour again through the heresy- shrivelled veins of the country, brace its sinews and inspire its heart; the old way should come back, the old loyalty to God and the Prince; these new fashions would melt before the fire of the Holy Sacrifice streaming out from every town and hamlet; the Precious Blood would flow again and make all clean — the sombre face had brightened at the thought and the shallow eyes lost their screens. She cried out that she knew as few else what was the power of that faith, for she had tested it herself through years of misery and weakness.

When the bells were set ringing again, and the processions went about the streets, and the Religious Houses throbbed again like great workshops of prayer and grace, and the children were taught the Faith that Christ brought on earth, and the priests went about loved and honoured as they had been thirty years back, and every church was instinct with the Divine Presence, and the altars were up again, and the carved and painted tale of God's mysteries on wall and window and loft; — then these new mean ways of isolation and craft and men's doctrines, and sedition and schism and the brood of evil things that loved the darkness — all would go; and the country should be happy and clean once more.

But there had been a reaction a minute later. The Queen had flung herself down in a chair and lain there silent and piteous once more.

Mary the Queen takes a Husband

" And what of me? " she had cried. " What will my prince say? "

She had said no more than that; but Jane had known what was in her mind.

She rose now and went to the window, thinking of it again, standing there with her peculiar air of grave steadiness.

The sun had dipped below the hill, and the country beyond the houses was dark and colourless; only overhead beyond the haze of smoke the sky was luminous and tender. The cool evening air, fragrant with earth and flowers rose to her nostrils, and a blackbird on the grass outside hopped and eyed her, and flew away chattering an alarm.

But the girl scarcely saw what her eyes rested upon. She was thinking of the Queen — of that rigid personality that could not express itself and, most piteous of all, that knew it could not; of the lack of wit and gaiety and the consciousness of that lack; and, above all, of those cold black eyes, the mouth that found it hard to smile and easy to contract, the pale cheeks, the tiny wrinkles... She contrasted it with the gay portrait of the Prince that hung at Richmond, the red painted lips to which she had seen Mary press her own....

But it was not wholly for herself that the Queen was; the girl had heard her once speak of a boy that should be hers and Philip's and England's; a straight-limbed gallant prince with fearless eyes and true heart, who should rule the country in the Faith of God — who — who would perhaps remember some day the soured mother who bore him, and sacrificed herself for his love — herself who had so few to love her.

The girl turned away from the window, with her quiet eyes full of tears, and went across to the Queen's door.

The Queen's Tragedy

It was a pleasant panelled room, new-carved with three rows of medallions bearing the Tudor rose and portcullis with other emblems and faces; but it was too dark now to see clearly. A great wave of rose-fragrance met her as she came in, pouring from the window and the heaped bowls set here and there.

" Will not your Grace have lights and go to bed? Or the priest is ready for prayers."

A figure turned away from the window and sat down.

" No sweetheart," came the deep voice.

" Sit down and talk to me, Jane."

The girl could not see much, for the Queen was in her tall chair now, with her back to the square-framed pale green sky that darkened every moment. There was a star out now, like a radiant jewel; and from jewels on her mistress' head-dress ran out swift sparkles. But the face was in deep shadow, a patch of paleness resting on a pale arm, that ran up slender and weak into the deep brocaded sleeve.

Jane talked of a hundred things in her slow soothing voice with her bright eyes downcast; of Sir Philip's stables; of a brawl between an archer and a rustic; of the kitchens she had been to visit, and the new-fashioned spits that they used there — all trifles such as the Queen liked to hear; and went on taking silence for words and words for speeches, for nearly half-an-hour. She perceived that the heaviness lay on her mistress still.

She ran dry at last, and sat waiting.

The Queen lifted her head a little.

" Yes," she said, " and we have not said our Lady's office. I cannot to-night. Compline will have to serve. The priest is ready."

" He has been ready an hour past, your Grace."

Still Mary did not move. She dropped her cheek on her hand again and was silent.

Mary the Queen takes a Husband

Mistress Dormer began to tell her of the abbey-church which she had been to see, of the goodly carving in it, and the monks' stalls, and the remnants of Harold's tomb by the high altar, destroyed fourteen years ago.

Again there fell a silence, and again Mary broke it.

" There is no courier froni the coast? " she asked.

" No, madam."

" Nor from town."

" Not since the one that came at supper- time, madam.'*

Still the Queen sat on, as silent and cold to her friend as to others. In a minute or two Mistress Dormer made a little movement in despair, half-afraid that the other had fallen asleep; but she saw the dark eyes rise for a moment and look at her, and then drop again into paleness.

Mistress Dormer was longing for bed, but she did not dare to move again. She could see that it was one of Mary's obstinate fits in which it was useless to make a proposal. She must just wait.

The room was as dark as a July night could make it

^fore the Queen spoke again.

" Jane," she said softly, " what gentlemen are with us?

-I mean of the ushers."

Mistress Dormer mentioned a dozen names.

" Not Master Manton? " Your Grace sent him to Southampton a week

Again there was a pause.

" Jane."

" Yes, madam."

" Is that gentleman happy at Court? "

" Surely —, madam."

" Ah! We have not done our Homer yet. Remind me when we are back in town."

" Yes, madam."

Again there was a silence. Then Jane lost her patience.

" Madam, will you not go to bed? "

" And what of prayers? "

" Well, prayers then, madam."

Mary rose abruptly.

"Prayers, then, Jane. Do you lead the way— I cannot see in the dark."

Mary the Queen takes a Husband

It was late on the Saturday evening, ten days later, when the procession crossed the steep High-street of Winchester, and turned towards Southgate.

It was a bewildering sight to Magdalene Dacre's eyes, as she sat between old Mrs. Clarentia and Mrs. Jane Dormer in the back seat of the great red carriage that followed just behind the Queen's.

The street was as bright as day, though the sky had faded to a kind of storm-lit glory. In every window blazed lights, from the twinkle of rush-lights high overhead in the jutting attics to the flaming street below where torches, blown about by the furious storm of wind moved along in endless profusion, marking a road of splendour down to where the two lines curved out of sight under the archway. Between these lines went the long rows of heads, in feather and steel, four abreast, guarded on either side by the ripple of pike-points. From every window hung tapestries and arras and cloth-of-gold, so that the street seemed like a vast and richly furnished corridor. A roar moved with the carriages as they went, tempestuous and overpowering; and Magdalene turned her eyes now and again from that stiffly bowing head before her in the Queen's carriage, to the banks of open mouths and crimson faces contorted with effort and the swaying lights, to the open mouths of alleys and streets on either side that disgorged fresh bellows of loyalty as her Grace's figure came in sight. The girl was almost deafened by the roar of v oices, by the brazen music of the church-bells overhead and the long shattering cries of the trumpets punctuated and steadied by the deep boom of the great bass-bell of the Cathedral far away to the left.

Old Mistress Clarentia came to her in her room in folvesey Palace half an hour later, as the girl sat pale

The Queen's Tragedy and tired in her satin and jewels, waiting for her summons to attend her Grace to supper.

" Will you not go to bed, my dear? " she said. "You are wearied out. I will explain to her Highness."

Magdalene shook her head.

" I would not lose it for the world," she said, " now that I am here. Oh, Mistress, what does her Grace think of it all? "

The old woman's face wrinkled up with emotion.

" I am just come from her," she said. " I have never seen her so happy. God bless my lamb! "

Magdalene looked at her anxiously. Was this emotion sincere? Was it possible for any emotions, but those of excitement and ambition and disgust, to be sincere in this gaudy false atmosphere? Since her recent arrival at Court she had done little but long for her home, and the wind-swept heather and the clean breezes, and the wholesome rain and cold.

" She is happy, Mistress? " she asked slowly.

The old woman's eyes looked at her suspiciously, but there was the glimmer of tears in them.

" Why, surely " she began.

Then the page came in to tell them that her Grace was ready to go down.

Magdalene watched the Queen eagerly that night; but there was little to support Mistress Clarentia's opinion.

She supped in state in the great hall, and on either cheek burned a spot of crimson.

Stephen Gardiner saw it; and Magdalene heard him congratulate the Queen softly on her health as he stood afterwards by her chair under the canopy which he had caused to be set for her two days before in the Presence-Chamber.

Mary the Queen takes a Husband

" I thank you, my lord," said Mary stiffly; and Magdalene saw her neck flush as she answered. Was that delight or weariness or shame?

He added a word or two about his poor house that she was honouring, and then apologised for the adjective, reminding her that it had been built by Royal hands: described the preparations made in the Deanery a hundred yards away for the coming of the Prince, and the traverses set up in the Cathedral choir; and at last kissed her hand and stepped aside.

Throughout the hour and a half of that audience the Queen seemed as stiff and passionless as ever, bowing her rigid head, giving her white jewelled hand, uttering to each who came up, a word or two in her deep man's voice.

" I thank you for your hospitality, sir," she said to the Dean who had left his house for Philip's convenience.

" I am grateful for your good wishes, my lord," she said to the Lord Treasurer who, Magdalene knew, had opposed the marriage from the beginning.

She bowed her head and said nothing at all to the quiet little Duke of Norfolk who was supposed to understand her as did none else.

" I thank you, sir. You did not think so once," she said shrewdly to her Secretary of State who had become her partisan from policy, and who now, kneeling in his new Order of the Garter, strove to forget that he had ever come to her to forbid her mass in the days of her humiliation.

" You must pray for me, my lords," she said to a couple of bishops who came up together: " Without God's grace all is useless."

It was over at last.

The Queen's Tragedy

Mary turned to the girl as they passed into the bedchamber, and caught her suddenly by the arm. Magdalene, startled altogether out of her complacent interest, saw that the Queen's cheeks were burning and her eyes alight with some emotion.

" Thank God! " she cried. " Now I have time to be merry alone. Kiss me, sweetheart. Nay, you must not hate me! "

Magdalene went away that night more puzzled than ever. The Queen had said no more; but had withdrawn once more into self-repression. She had slowly kissed the girl good-night, but without a word; and Magdalene's last sight of her had been as she sat half undressed in her deep chair, her hair on her shoulders, and old Mrs. Clarentia's arms round her rocking her gently to and fro. There had been a look of content in the old woman's face, and in Jane Dormer's too, that had puzzled this new lady-in-waiting. Were these two consummate hypocrites, or did they indeed find something in that unloveable woman that no others could find?

As Magdalene brushed out her hair that night opposite the silver-framed mirror she did not notice her own pretty face. She was thinking of the Queen's shadowed eyes, her repellent dignity, and wondered, as many others were wondering, at the shrewishness she had shown that night. And why had her Grace said that about hatred? She shivered and shook her head.

The groups dispersing through the still lighted Close also discussed her Grace's bearing and her future. A couple of iurred and cloaked canons walking together commented frankly on her chance of bearing a child.

" There will be no prince," concluded one, as they came to the Slype passage; " believe me, sir, that Philip will

Mary the Queen takes a Husband be off to Spain again in a fortnight. We must look to the Lady Elizabeth to give us a king."

" Did you see her coldness to my lord bishop? " said the other. " I think she has no friends."

" There is yet my lord Cardinal. How of him for a husband if Philip will not have her? He is no priest yet. And he is her cousin."

The two came through the Slype and reached the west door of the Cathedral as they talked; and one of them pushed upon it gently. It yielded; he pushed yet harder and it opened, and the two looked in.

The great place was full of sound and darkness only broken by the glimmer of lights in two or three places where the workmen were still busy upon the preparations for the wedding. From somewhere in the roof clear through the soft riot of the wind came the echoing blows of a hammer that drove the pegs from which the arras was to hang, but it ceased as the two watched. Huge shadows barring the light of the lantern carried along the clerestory, wheeled out like spokes to mix with the deeper gloom of the roof. There was another light burning within Wykeham's chantry on the right, and it threw bars of darkness and patches of brightness on a great shimmering sheet of cloth of gold already in its place on one of the vast pillars on the opposite side of the nave. The choir was in shadow, except for the glimmer of the upper lines of the reredos and the carved roof above it on which shone and faded the flickering light of the lamp before the Most Holy Sacrament. Up the paleness of the floor ran a long wooden platform to the entrance beneath the screen above which rose the three huge figures of the Passion; and shapeless heaps of rugs and furniture and timbers lay piled on either side. There were lonely voices calling out of the darkness one to another; a.re crossed the nave noiselessly over the carpets

The Queen's Tragedy fifty yards away, bearing a beam across his shoulders; it seemed like one carrying a cross.

The whole vast place was like a pillared hall where the dead moved and cried to one another, and went about strange ceremonies; its shadows and paleness seemed wholly apart from the glare of life and movement whence the two priests had come — from the buzz of the Court, the flare and shouting of the streets, the steel-clad knights and tabarded heralds. It found there its only echo in the central figure herself, with her silence and self-repression and with it all her significance and secret life.

The two closed the door again as noiselessly as they had opened it, and went on their way.

Dick Kearsley and Jack Norris were still lounging in the hall half an hour after the Queen had retired and the company gone. It was their duty to wait there until the signal was given that the Court was clear of strangers.

Kearsley was leaning against the scaffold at the upper end; and Norris was astride of a bench beside him. They, too, were gossiping.

" Her Grace was in a panic on Thursday," remarked Jack, " when the wind blew. She feared for Philip. Mistress Dormer was saying that she neither ate nor drank till after three o'clock. To-day she cares nothing for the storm. Her lord is landed."

Dick grunted sourly.

" And the Frenchmen are a trouble to her," went on the other. " I saw her eyeing De Noailles at Richmond, as if she sorely wished to ask him how his master did."

" There is more reason in the Frenchmen," snarled Kearsley, " and that damned Eliza."

But in spite of his bitterness he was triumphing in his heart. It seemed as if other schemes had come to nothing, and that Mary was conqueror.

Mary the Queen takes a Husband

" You saw the jewels he sent last month," went on Norris presently. " I was at Guildford when they came, and saw her go white and red as the Don brought them up. She has them here too, and will wear them at the wedding."

Dick nodded abruptly. He was biting his nails as if ill at ease.

" He has reached Southampton at least," proceeded Jack, " in spite of the seamen. You heard of their matter? "

" Yes, the dogs! " snapped Kearsley.

They talked for a minute or two of the report of Lord Emngham that he could not trust his men to guard the Prince of Spain on his voyage; and of the Queen's instant action in ordering their dismissal.

" There will be more trouble yet," observed Jack Norris finally. " I heard a fellow say that Philip drew his sword as he came to land. Pray God we may come peaceably out of it here. Master Manton will be here when the Prince comes. He is gone to Southampton with Sir Anthony Browne. That is a good fellow, Dick; but harder than I thought him at first."

" He is well enough. But he is too much of a scholar for the Court. We do not want Terence here."

" He will not be here long, I think," went on the other. " He said as much to me one day. He is no lover of her Grace. But I would sooner have him a thousand times than that damned hot-gospeller Underbill."

Dick grunted again.

Three or four servants came in, and began to clear up the hall; and the two could talk no more. Through the open door that gave on to the Court Jack could see a link or two still moving about. The rush and bustle was over; but from the direction of College Street still came the cries of the servants and the sound of wheels

The Queen's Tragedy and horses' hoofs. Through the high windows of the hall there still shone fitfully from outside the dying illuminations kindled to welcome the Queen. The house itself was quiet.

Jack wondered what the Queen was doing. Perhaps she was at her prayers; perhaps gone to bed; perhaps looking out over the glare of the town.

He loved her no more than did the rest of her servants. He would have preferred a sprightlier Queen, less icy, more genial; but it seemed to him now that this marriage of hers was more human than almost any of her acts. The romance with which she regarded it was evident even to him. He had seen it in her flushed cheeks to-night, and had recognised it from the tales that ran about the Court of her passionate suspense when a storm blew from the south-west, or a veiled threat from France came to her through the hands of a courier.

What nonsense it was, Jack said to himself — this love for a man whom she had never seen! He had laughed over it in private, frequently, during this last three months — over her folly about Philip's picture, her anxiety for a letter of his that never came, her poses and her smiles before the painter who had made her portrait for the Prince. It was surely a ludicrous affair enough, this coquetry of a haggard woman of thirty-seven towards a young man, who, if tales were true, had other loves to occupy him.

He would not have laughed if she had been as sedate in this affair as in others; if she had passionlessly accepted any husband whom her Council advised, and had prepared to do her duty and bear a prince with as little emotion as that with which she ate her dinner. But those raptures and love-sicknesses were absurd. They should be left to younger folks.

But Jack had not laughed with Dick Kearsley. Once

M

Mary the Queen takes a Husband when he had attempted it, a year ago, he had received such a scornful glare that the mirth had died on his lips, and he did not think it wise to attempt it with Guy Manton.

But there were other good fellows besides these, who better understood the cynicism of thirty years, and the ripe experience of one who had lived in three Courts and knew the follies and weaknesses of men and women. And they could always be silent and laugh in secret when persons who still kept their youthful illusions or had not sufficient good-humour came into the parlour.

So Jack sat now, swinging his white silk legs, his cap on his head, and a flush of excitement in his cheeks comparing Magdalene and Mary, while Dick bit his nails beside him.

The Queen's Tragedy

The Queen sat in her private parlour opening out of the Presence-Chamber in my lord's palace, waiting for news.

She had scarcely shown herself in public since the Saturday night, and it was now forty-eight hours after. Three of her ladies were with her; Mistress Jane Dormer as always, irresistibly soothing and friendly, stood leaning at the back of the Queen's chair, Margaret Clifford waited by the half-open door, glancing now at the Queen, now into the room beyond as if expectant; another, Mistress Susan Young, stood patiently by the bedroom door on another side, waiting and watching.

Mary herself sat upright, gripping the bosses of her chair-arm, tense and tight-lipped. Her head trembled a little. Once Jane leaned forward and stroked the Queen's arm gently; but the coifed head jerked abruptly, and Jane sighed and drew softly back.

Half-an-hour before they had heard the crash of artillery, and then the bells, the trumpets and the cheering that told them of the Prince's arrival at the Cathedral; and Mary had started up with clenched hands and taken a swift step towards the window; but Jane had caught her and drawn her back softly; since then she had sat silent.

Outside the evening was closing in; there were heavy clouds scudding swiftly in a grey sky, angry with sunset light; and from time to time a gust of rain-laden wind shrilled from the south-west, shaking the latches of the windows, lifting the arras curtains that hung beside them, and blurring the panes with the flying water. It had rained heavily all day, and night was coming on dark and comfortless.

There sounded once more a crash of bells, windy and mellow, and a torrent of sound followed it.

[ary the Queen takes a Husband

Again Mary sprang to her feet and stood swaying there, listening to the gusts of cheering, the shrill distant trumpets and the brazen thunder from the tower. But Jane was behind her with a caressing murmur which did not cease in spite of the Queen's sharp gesture for silence; and presently Mary was down again in her chair, with parted lips and white face, listening and waiting once more.

Then Margaret nodded to her, and threw the door wide; there was a sound of footsteps in the Presence-Chamber; and Magdalene came swiftly through, panting a little, with her splendid head upraised, and her skirts rustling behind her.

She came straight across the room, dropped on her knees, and lifted one of the cold hands to her lips. Mary had not stirred again at her coming. Jane nodded impatiently from behind the chair.

" He is come, madam," stammered Magdalene, glancing anxiously at Mistress Dormer.

Margaret closed the door, and came across to where Jane stood behind the chair. Susan had vanished into the bedroom beyond; and the four were alone.

The Queen drew a slow breath, and sat a little forward.

" Tell me all," she said.

Magdalene Dacre lifted her eyes waveringly, dropped them again; drew a long breath, and began, tremulously as if repeating a lesson.

" I was within the Cathedral as your Grace bade me; just within the west door with Mrs. Rise below the scaffold. The bishops stood outside on the edge of the scaffold with their backs to me in copes and mitres — my lords of Winchester, Durham, London and the rest. I could see the space cleared before the door for His Highness to dismount, and the guards keeping it, with

The Queen's Tragedy my Lord Pembroke on a horse at one side — and the torches burning.

" Then the Prince came "

Mary made an impatient movement of her head. Magdalene understood, and went on hastily.

" I could not see him clearly at first, your Grace. I could not tell which was he; there were so many with him — they filled all the space so far as I could see. Then he dismounted, and came up the steps on to the scaffold, and he knelt down before my lord of Winchester. I could not see what he did; but one told me afterwards that he took the crucifix and kissed it. The organs were playing all the while, and the trumpets blowing outside....

" Then they came along the scaffold, and I saw His Highness."

She looked swiftly up at the strained face watching her, and went on more quickly than ever, as if in desperation.

" Your Grace, he bore himself very gallantly, walking behind my lord, with his cap on his head. There was a white feather in it, but draggled somewhat with the rain, and he had on a rich purple coat with gold and lace. He — he is as the picture shows him, but more gallant."

The Queen drew a swift breath, but said nothing.

" They went away, your Grace, with the clerks and priests and boys before, singing " Laus honor et virtus " as they went, as your Grace directed, and the organs playing. The tapers were alight upon the high altar, and all the altars and on the rood-beam....

" His Highness took off his cap as he entered the choir, and made obeisance to the most holy sacrament. Then he turned off to his traverse on the left, and went up into it and kneeled down, but I could not see him there.

Mary the Queen takes a Husband

' The organs played for a while softly till he had done his prayer, and then struck the tone of Te Deum. My lord began it, and it was sung by the clerks....

" When it was doing I came out, and passed through the cloister on my way and saw the guards on the way to the deanery. They were in their rich coats, and everyone bore a torch, as your Grace said was to be. As I came through the garden, I heard the bells again to show that his Highness was come out."

Magdalene Dacre hesitated, leaned forward, lifted the passive hand to her lips and kissed it once more, as Jane nodded and smiled encouragingly.

The Queen sat rigid a moment longer, and then spoke in her hard voice.

" And the other matter? "

"It is arranged your Grace. My Lord Arundel will bring his Highness here to-night at ten o'clock."

There was a profound silence for a moment or two, only broken by the stir of the wind and the scuds of rain against the window-panes. Then Mary rose abruptly pushing back her chair. Jane Dormer took two swift steps round and caught her by the waist.

" Ah! you do not understand — you do not understand! not one of you! " sobbed the Queen.

Three hours later they were standing again behind the Queen's chair. Her mood had changed again, and she was radiant. Again she was flushed, and in the soft light of the candles round the walls looked ten years younger. She was in a magnificent costume of white and silver, sewn with pearls in every seam; on her head was her white coif, alight with diamonds, and another great

The Queen's Tragedy stone burned on her breast below the collar of pearls that lay on her pale bare neck.

There was another tall chair beside hers, empty, and a foostool stood before it, embroidered with the loves of Apollo. She had chosen it herself three days before. A little wood-fire burned on the wide hearth.

The door into the Presence-Chamber was open, and Master Norris stood there in rigid profile, bare-headed and in his white suit.

Magdalene Dacre looked gloriously young and splendid behind the chair, half a head taller than the others; but she was not thinking about herself. She was doing her utmost to realise the mind that was so alert in the figure beneath. From where did this passion come, the hysterical screaming of three hours ago? They had carried Mary into her bedroom and laid her on the bed, and she had lain there sobbing half an hour, reproaching them for lack of sympathy, crying out that no one loved her or understood her; but that her Prince would come soon to comfort her. Magdalene thought of the face she had seen that afternoon going up the long raised walk from the west end to the choir of the great church, and wondered whether there was a power to comfort in the soul behind. She had been more interested than she had thought possible.

How strange was this mistress of hers! She had dressed with enthusiasm, when the fit of crying was over. She seemed more like a girl than a woman of thirty-seven; both her coldness and her weakness had gone together. Was there anything but love to explain it, and what was there to explain the love?

Mary turned and smiled into her face, as she pondered.

" You are too grave, sweetheart," she whispered, and the girl smiled back with troubled eyes.

Mary the Queen takes a Husband

Jack Norris made a slight movement at the door, and a stir ran through the four ladies as they heard footsteps in the outer room.

But Mary was on her feet too now, slender and perfectly upright, her hands folded before her, as the gentle-men bowed low at the door, and a figure came through alone.

Magdalene swept down to the ground in a great courtesy with the three beside her, and the Queen in front, and then lifted her eyes and looked.

There were two or three gentlemen at the door, in its shadow, and bright against that dark background was a splendid creature, gemmed from head to foot, with a short crimson cloak thrown back from his white costume; the diamonded Garter blazed below his left knee; his plumed cap was in his hand as he recovered from his deep bow; and his pear-shaped head, crowned above by flaxen hair and ending below in a short fair pointed beard, was thrown back on his shoulders. From beneath his white forehead his large blue-grey eyes ran swiftly up and down the Queen's figure, and dropped again. He looked his full ten years younger than Mary.

The Queen's deep voice said something in Spanish that Magdalene could not catch, and Philip answered with a low deliberate word or two, bowing again as he did so.

Then they advanced to one another, the Prince holding out his jewelled hands. Mary laid her own in them, and he kissed her delicately on the cheek.

Then they turned and came hand in hand towards the two chairs, and as the Queen made a sign to her ladies, Magdalene saw that her face was flushed from forehead to chin.

The girl made her courtesy with the others, and the three ladies went out from the parlour.

The Queen's Tragedy

There were a dozen gentlemen in the Presence Chamber; Lord Arundel with a small group of English and Spanish nobles, stood in the centre of the room; two ushers were by the further door leading into the great hall, and Mr. Norris who had closed the parlour-door, stood now like a statue a yard from it. A long cushioned settle was placed beneath the high scaffold between the windows on the left, and on this the three ladies sat down in silence.

Magdalene Dacre looked round the room with a strange sense of excitement. The whole matter seemed unreal — this great silent room, blazing with lights from its tapes-tried walls, the group in the centre talking with almost soundless voices, the stiff ushers by the doors, the absence of the clamour and movement that had filled men's ears and eyes during these past days, and yet she knew very well that the heart of this quiet event was more momentous than any of the rest. It was fitting, she vaguely felt, that the trumpets and bells and shouting should be silent at this crisis, as the music of organs and choirs, the movements of the sacred ministers and the rustle of the people is suddenly hushed before the supreme climax of the Sacrifice.

She longed for an instant to whisper to Jane Dormer, whom she could feel slightly shivering beside her; but the desire passed; she dropped her eyes again, folded her hands and gave herself up to astonished reflection.

Jane, too, was meditating on what she had seen.

In that swift glance from behind the Queen's chair she had seen the first meeting of man and a woman who were to be husband and wife in two days — a meeting which was the result of a long and slow approach; she had watched for months past though she had scarcely

Mary the Queen takes a Husband realised it at the time, the gathering into the woman's hands of the threads, strung with jewels and gifts that were drawing the man slowly across land and sea into an intimate relation that should endure till death. The threads had been coiled in richer day by day in the loads that hung on them and in their promise of the final prize. Then the end grew more imminent; the woman had advanced southwards to meet her husband, and had paused at last in that little room next door; the last moments had passed; the door had opened, and in silence for the first time the jewelled prize had shown itself.

What of it?

Now they were together, each eyeing the other.

But Jane had watched more than that. She had watched from her side a passion that grew day by day hotter and more fierce, as imagination and hope and religious fervour and desire for love wrought their effect on a lonely soul. She had seen a woman, cut off from the world by ramparts first of suffering, then of high rank, and lastly of unloveability, stretching out thin hands more passionately every day as the hot fire raged within her, crying out to the fancy that her own mind had wrought on the clouds to come down and be incarnate and take her to himself, and compensate her for the long years of isolation. And a figure had answered the call, and stepped to her side — a figure with blue eyes and yellow hair as of the Prince she had dreamed of — gallant and upright and of flesh and blood like her own.

And now they were together, each eyeing the other with clasped hands.

But there was one more point in the drama.

These two persons next door were not as others, for neither approached the other apart from the world. Behind them stood the nations, two temperaments, two

The Queen's Tragedy ambitions, almost two faiths. Behind the woman lay a sea of pale and ruddy English faces, watching jealously her every movement, alert to perceive the smallest falter, quick to detect mistakes, eager to punish, sullen and remorseless to resent them — an army of persons who had scarcely yet accepted her as their champion, who doubted her ability, distrusted her sincerity, and repudiated her aims. And behind the man stood a dark mighty nation, hot-blooded, proud with the conquests of centuries, rich beyond belief, contemptuous of rivalry, watching their lord too, jealous lest he should even for a moment betray their interests to this new little northern power whose insolence almost equalled their own pride.

Behind that door there was a great mystery beginning; of which no man could see the consummation, it was well that the trumpets and bells should be silent, that the door should be closed and the curtain against it; the bellowing uncouth crowds, who understood nothing but their own mean passions, excluded; and that only a few who knew, not all indeed, but more than the rest, should wait silent on the threshold during those first pregnant rites.

Then back on the girl's mind rushed the amazing human interest of it all once more. She forgot the vast issues, or what men count vast, the destinies of the nations; she forgot even her own homesickness in the drama before her — a man and woman side by side, each utterly ignorant of the other, but already bound each to the other as firmly as ever marriage vows could make them. Ah! how horrible that was, but how fascinating!

Of the character on the one side she knew what few others knew — its needs, its aspirations, and its weaknesses; of the other side she knew nothing except what tales and a moment's look could give her.

Mary the Queen takes a Husband

It was said that the Prince's life was impure. If that were true, would it be likely that Mary would win him to chastity? Mary demanded faithfulness above all else; it was the lack of it that had soured her. Was it probable that she would find it in the person from whom she needed it most, and had the most right to demand it?

Was it prejudice only, the girl asked herself, that made her think that the Prince's face justified the tales? Or had there been something in his quick look as he entered, in his scarlet broad lips and gay eyes that lent colour to what she had heard?

Ah! well — it was horrible — horrible and inevitable!

She looked up sharply at a movement.

Master Norris had turned his head slightly by the door; and at the same instant the gentlemen in the middle of the room ceased their low talking.

She saw the two ushers by the further door straighten themselves, and then on the silence rasped the hiss of curtain strings, as Master Norris tore back the hanging arras and laid his hand on the latch.

A moment later he had flung the door wide, and Jane rose to her feet with the others.

She did not see Philip's face, for she was only rising from her courtesy as he turned; but she watched him go briskly down the room, putting his cap on his head as he did so. She saw him turn, however, for a moment at the further door, and saw again his yellow beard, his white forehead and blue eyes as he spoke with the smallest inclination to the Englishmen who bowed behind his own Spaniards.

" Good-neight, my lards all."

Then he was gone, and Jane, after another glance 77

The Queen's Tragedy at Jack's disappearing green back, led the other ladies into the Queen's parlour.

Mary was standing there with the gleeful flushed face of a happy child. For a moment the shadows on her face were gone; her stiff lips were smiling, and her shallow eyes shone like stars.

"Did you hear my Prince?" she cried to Jane, holding her by the shoulders. " I taught him that! — ' Good-night, my lords all.' "

Mary the Queen takes a Husband

Mistress Jane Dormer was early in the Queen's bedroom next morning. The extraordinary reaction of gaiety had not passed with the night, and as she helped Mary to dress, the Queen talked incessantly, when the maids were out of the room, of the Prince's gallant bearing, his beauty, and his nobleness.

The mood lasted all day till evening.

After mass and breakfast till dinner Mistress Dormer was busy with the dresses and jewels, and Mary was continually in and out of the room where she sat, directing and counter-ordering; there were some new jewels that Philip had given her that she must wear next day; she would have two rows of diamonds on her coif, not three.

Mistress Dormer did not dine in hall that day, nor attend the public reception of which the affair of last night had been but a private rehearsal; but she was busy all the afternoon with the final preparations upstairs, looking out only once on to the court, as the crash of horns and the shrilling of strings and voices told her that Philip was come to make love before the crowd.

There they went; the train of dark nobles before and behind between the lines of the guards, and in the midst came Philip, stepping deliberately with downcast eyes, in his black and silver cloak and white hose, with the insignia of the Garter. De Feria was behind him.

Then they went in, and Mistress Dormer knew what was happening, for the Queen had told her what she would do. She would be on the scaffold as he entered, and come down from it to welcome him. She would kiss him then, and lead him up into the Presence-Chamber, where they would sit together beneath the cloth-of-estate that blazed with the English and Spanish

The Queen's Tragedy arms behind them, and would talk there in Spanish as they had talked last night.

She went in again from the gallery and listened a moment. From beneath still rang up the instruments and the noise of cheering from the hall. Then she passed on into the Queen's room where the women sat and stitched, to give final directions and examine their work. She took up the coif which had just been laid aside, and looked at it.

" This will not serve," she said, " the jewels are too close. Give me the scissors."

She went through into her own room, next door and as she sat down by the window, the door opened and tall young Magdalene Dacre rustled in. Her red lips were tightly closed and her head was thrown back almost defiantly.

" Her Grace sent me to you," she said, " to see how all went. Let me help you."

The two took each one end of the coif, opposite to one another in the window-seat, and began to unpick the upper row of diamonds. Neither spoke for a while, but worked in silence; and one by one the shining stones, each in its tiny ring of silver, dropped into their hands and were laid aside.

As Jane reached across for the silver thread to begin the re-stitching, the two girls' eyes met.

Jane sighed softly.

" Well? " she asked.

Magdalene's lips twitched a moment.

" Well, all has been as was arranged," she said. " Her Grace came down from the scaffold and kissed him, and led him through to the Presence-Chamber, and there they sit now, smiling and talking, with all eyes on them."

She spoke with a touch of bitterness, and Jane glanced at her again — at her flushed cheeks and bright eyes.

Mary the Queen takes a Husband

" It must be so, sweetheart," she said; " you and I cannot wed like that, but she must."

" And the end of it? " asked the other sharply, intent on her stitching again; but the needle paused as she put the question.

Jane sighed again.,

" If he is good to her " she began.

Magdalene lowered her hands for a moment and looked across indignantly.

" Are any good to her? " she said, " or has she ever asked it? "

" She has asked it in her own way a thousand times," said Jane quietly, " but it seems that none has the heart to understand. But this time surely all but the blind must see. Are you blind, my child? "

" I have seen a woman in love with a picture."

" Not a picture," said Jane, " that is nothing; it is a heart that she wants, and she cannot find one. God grant that she may! "

Magdalene dropped the diamond she was holding, and stooped for it.

" I do not believe it," she said steadily, as she sat upright again; " she has no heart herself. And she is playing to herself now. — And if not, can this Prince give her one? "

Mistress Dormer was silent a moment.

" Dear child," she said, " you do not know her. She has not shown her heart to you. You did not know her when her mother was taken from her. I saw her then."

Magdalene bent her head lower still and gave no answer.

Jane drove the lesson home.

" It is not that she has no heart, but that it has been broken too often, and she fears to show it now."

Magdalene drew a swift breath that was almost a sob.

The Queen's Tragedy

Jane glanced at her.

" Sweetheart," she said softly, " you hate her Grace, do you not? "

" God help me! I don't know... I hate it all. I am afraid, Jane.... And what if the Prince breaks her heart once more — as he will? "

" Then our Lord must comfort her," said Jane.

It was late that night before Mistress Dormer was alone with the Queen. Mary was in the Presence-Chamber doing business till ten o'clock, and Jane was occupied in the bedroom laying out the splendid things that would be used next day.

A broad low wardrobe with a table on either side of it stood at the foot of the Queen's bed, and on these were ranged the shining masses of silk and brocade and jewels, down to the cloth of silver shoes and the pins for the hair. In the centre lay the great outer robe of French brocade — Tudor roses, sheafs of arrows, dragons and wreaths, raised on a gold ground. There were great rebras sleeves attached to this that would sweep the ground when the robe was put on; but turned up within the elbow, so as to show the gold lining, with clusters of gold and jewels. Beside it lay the train of the same material, blazing with diamonds, and with every design outlined by countless pearls; and on the right hand table the white satin kirtle, embroidered all over with silver, and stiffened within by whale-bone and netting. The coif, finished at last, rested on the second table, and about it, laid out on shimmering silk, flashed the jewels — an endless profusion of ropes of pearls to be worn about the neck, diamonds, rubies and emeralds; and, above all, laid by itself, winked the huge stone that Philip had sent.

Jane lighted two pairs of candles and set them here

Mary the Queen takes a Husband and there among the clothes, and as she stepped back the Queen came in with her ladies.

Mary stood in silence before the long array of glory, and Mistress Dormer, also in silence, turned a candle this way and that, lifted the chinking train that hung down upon the floor and let it drop again, smoothed out the folds of the outer robe to show the pattern.

Still the Queen said nothing, and Jane glanced at her. Mary was flushed again as she had been last night, and her eyes were bright, but her lips were closed with a kind of severity. The girl's heart sank at the sight.

Then the Queen turned to her ladies.

" Good-night," she said, " I shall need none but Mistress Dormer to-night."

When they were gone out she turned once more to Jane, and looked her in the eyes.

" Prayers," she said steadily, " I had no time for the priest."

Jane lifted two of the candles and carried them across to the prie-dieu beside the bed, and set them down there on the upper ledge, on either side of the Spanish crucifix that stretched lean silver arms against an ebony cross. Behind it hung a picture of Mary, the crowned mother of God, with the Divine Prince in her arms who smiled and lifted two fingers as a pontiff wherewith to bless the world.

The Queen went across the room, pushed aside the book that lay on the sloping desk, and knelt down. The girl knelt down behind her.

The palace was silent now. The wind had dropped; the guards had been changed ten minutes before in the court outside, and the tramp and challenges were over. The last page had left the Presence-Chamber two doors

The Queen's Tragedy away, and there was not a sound from within, or from the sleeping city without, to break the stillness.

As Jane, despairing of prayer after one passionate effort, looked round the tall dark room, all was motionless there; there was no wind to-night to stir the hangings on the walls, or the tapestries of the great bed; there was not even the quick flicker of a flame on the hearth to break the dead peace. The Queen was motionless in front, her hands clasped on the desk, and her steady head raised towards the royal Mother and Child, across which, as if to bar the road to joy, agonised the silver crucifix. The candle flames on either side were yellow spear-points against the dark arras. It appeared that inanimate things had a consciousness of crisis.

The minutes passed, and Jane wondered that the Queen did not open her book. It seemed to her, who knew Mary so well, that another subtle element had been woven into her mood. Her voice as she told her ladies to go had had the old touch of coldness; and her eyes had been reserved and controlled.

And then before Mistress Dormer had come to any conclusion, the climax came swift and dramatic.

Mary threw herself suddenly forward on to the desk, her face on her arms, with such passion that a candle reeled and fell and went out as it crashed on to the floor. Jane was at her side, her arm about her, and her voice whispering she knew not what, as the long, half-audible wailing began.

" Oh! my God, what have I done?... What is this that is come to me?... Oh! my God, am I not punished enough for my sins?... I dare not; I dare not.... I am Thy maiden... I know I have sinned... I have denied Thee so often; and I confess it again and again.... When... when I denied Thy

Mary the Queen takes a Husband

Vicar to save my life... Oh! my God... have mercy on me... I dare not even for Thy sake.. but I have kept myself pure for Thee, my pure Saviour... and now I dare not... Ave Maria, gratia plena, Dominus tecum.... Oh! Mary, maiden and mother.... for thy dear Child's sake... help me. But there is none to love me but thou... they are all against me.... Am I not punished enough,... but that this must come to me.... Oh! pure Virgin have pity on a virgin.... Oh! Jesu, sweet Saviour, the maiden's Child...."

The wailing died away into silence, and the Queen's body sank lower still.

Jane held her tightly, feeling the labouring heart under her hand, and the noiseless sobs that shook it. Then she began, piteously in a quiet voice, scarcely knowing what she said —

" Pater noster qui es in ccelis..." and the Queen answered her at the end:

"... Sed liber a nos a malo."

Then again after a long silence, the two rose together.

Mary was quiet enough after that, as her lady helped her to undress, laying the clothes aside one by one in the press beyond the bed, for they would not be needed on the morrow.

The Queen washed her face, slipped into bed, and lay there silent with closed eyes.

Jane looked at her once or twice as she went about the room with an agony of pity in her heart — at that ageing face white and framed in her dark hair against the white pillow; at those thin down-turned sullen lips, those shadowed eyelids with the tiny lines at the angles, that sharp chin that had lost its softness, the cheeks that had

The Queen's Tragedy lost their colour; and at the outline of the hands clasped on the breast beneath the rich lion-embroidered coverlet.

As she turned from the press at last after latching the doors, she saw that Mary's eyes were open and fixed on her.

" Sleep with me to-night," said the rough, piteous voice, " it will be the last time."

Jane went across to the bed and knelt down by it, laying her hands across the Queen's.

" Dear mistress! " she said, " you know I would die for you. But what can I do? Leave all to God. He knows all."

Mary turned her head away. Jane could only see the smooth neck beneath the heavy coiled hair.

" Madam," she said again, pressing the hidden hands tightly, " is there aught that I can do? You love him now, do you not? "

The Queen's face turned sharply back again, and it was alight with emotion.

" Love him? " she cried. " Who could but love him? And for all that he brings? Is he not a gallant Prince? But what of myself? "

" Madam " began Jane again, but the Queen tore herself free and sat up.

" What of myself? " she cried again. " Oh! Jane will you lie to me like the rest? Am I not old and withered? "

" Ah! but your Grace is comely," said Jane in an agony. " Has he not told you that? "

Mary stared at her a moment; and then dropped back on the pillow.

"Well, well," she said, "I do not know. " her voice broke. " Make haste and come to bed."

When the girl came back in her night-clothes a few 86

Mary the Queen takes a Husband minutes later she found the Queen lying on her side with closed eyes once more; her lips were parted and she seemed asleep.

Jane drew the curtains softly, and blew out all the candles but one tall one, that would burn till morning, which she set on the Queen's side of the bed, and then going round the tables where the wedding-clothes lay ready, she slipped softly between the sheets, unlooping the heavy tapestry so that it fell forward on her side too.

In the dark twilight of the shrouded bed she could make out the Queen's face lying towards her as she herself lay down.

Then she heard her name whispered, slipped towards her mistress, and took her in her arms without a word, and so they lay.

The deep silence settled down again; there was no sound in Jane's ears but the soft breathing on the pillow beside her, the tiny rustle of the sheet as it rose and fell with each breath, and the sensation rather than the sound of the beating heart against her own.

It was two hours later when she woke, for she heard a bell beat one o'clock; but a sound close beside her reminded her where she was before she moved.

The Queen was whispering in her sleep, but so low that the words were scarcely audible — only the whistle of breath and the movements of lips; but Jane thought she spoke Spanish.

Then she suddenly stirred and sighed and spoke aloud.

"Is he not gallant — my Prince? "

The Queen's Tragedy

Master John Norris, gentleman-usher, was becoming a little tired with his long station in the Cathedral.

He had stood there, on the south of the high altar for over an hour, and had looked at every detail fifty times over — at the huge stone canopied reredos overhead, with its central crucifix above and the glory of plate and tapers below, at the two tapestried traverses for the King and Queen, one beside him and one opposite; at the mortuary chests hung between earth and heaven in the screen on the other side with the striped arras behind it; at the northern row of the stalls disappearing westwards; at the high blazoned roof overhead, and the glimpse of the transept. Then he had brought out his beads and said them twice; then he had fallen to looking about him again. There was no one to whom he could talk; his friends were elsewhere, with the exception of Guy Manton, who faced him from the other side of the choir resplendent in his green and white and gold — he seemed sullen again, thought Jack, and stood staring moodily about him. Dick Kearsley and the other gentlemen were to come in her Grace's procession, and near himself there were only a couple of Hampshire squires in tight, ill-fitting clothing, who had somehow obtained places here, and were glaring solemnly at him and one another and their unfamiliar surroundings.

Jack became desperate. He could see so little from where he stood; the side of the Queen's traverse blocked out his view down into the nave, whence came a steady murmur of voices from the hundreds of folk gathered there.

He hesitated what to do; and as he hesitated, there came a sudden burst of sound; the murmur waxed to a roar; the pealing bells overhead clashed all together, the organs sounded out, and trumpets tore the air with a shattering cry.

Mary the Queen takes a Husband

Jack stepped softly forward from his place and looked out from behind the traverse.

Westwards stretched the choir, carpeted throughout ite length, with a blaze of colour on either side, where the copes of the singing men and clerks, and the surplices of the boys — Tom Bradshawe among them— led by two lines down to the rood-screen where the mitred prelates stood raised high on the scaffold on which the wedding would take place. Beyond, there was little to be seen, but the hangings of the nave with the sunlight on them, the vast white pillars and clerestory above now reverberating with sound, and between the rows of splendid figures beneath the rood screen a glimpse of the packed heads of the crowd.

The murmur of bells and music and talk grew louder yet as he stared; an instant later the prelates moved in their places, and Jack could see that a procession had come up and halted outside the choir. No doubt it was the King and his sixty Spanish nobles.

Then again the minutes began to pass slowly; the organs sank to a lower strain, the bells resolved into their measured peal again, and the murmur of the crowd died almost to a whisper.

Jack sighed, took out his beads once more, and began to tell them; and as his lips moved, his mind worked elsewhere.

He was sincerely pleased at the success of the whole affair, though he was amused at the emotions that were carrying it through. Her Grace's love-sickness was absurd enough; but her obstinacy was respectable, and would bear good fruit. There would be a prince no doubt in nine months; Philip would be little more than a King-Consort in the government of England; and would carry on his Spanish life of love and hot wine behind

The Queen's Tragedy closed doors, though he might drink beer in public and say, " Good-night, my lords all," every night of his reign. But England would be pacified by an English prince; the wretched insular mingle-mangle of politics and faith would be done away with for ever, and the old ways would come back with the Cardinal next winter.

He looked round him again presently, as he thought of it, at the glory round him that told of the old worship for which this splendid place had been built; the curtained pyx above the altar, the rich credence-table, the canopy and the care-cloth laid ready, and all the rest; and as a devout Catholic he thanked Mary Queen of Heaven for Mary Queen of England; and began to attend to his Aves.

Ten minutes later the exultant tumult of sound broke out again, and he knew that Mary was come.

Of the wedding itself he could see nothing and hear little. There was only the shining group dimly seen beyond the rood-screen raised high on the scaffold; and in the silence the murmur of voices, now one, now another. It was Bishop Gardiner's first — his, who had opposed the marriage, but would reap its harvest — Jack could hear little of what was said, and he had no book.

There was a question asked at last, and a silence; then a murmur, then a stupendous roar of applause. Jack craned his head this way and that but could see nothing; no doubt it was the giving away of the bride by the four English peers, he told himself. The applause sank to silence, a voice rose and fell, murmurous and inaudible, and finally was drowned once more in cheering, the sudden clash of bells, and the cry of trumpets. Then as the organs began to make themselves heard, and

Mary the Queen takes a Husband the group outside the screen shifted and broke, Jack leapt back to his place. They were coming up to the altar.

As the Latin psalm rolled out from the doubled choir, he was standing again erect at his station on the first step, with his back against the south screen, a yard from the two squires on either side, and to all appearances no more than a stiff Court figure emotionless and correct. But his eyes moved from left to right steadily, as the stream came up and broke into glittering backwaters and eddies; he saw the scarlet and white and gold surge to the steps; then the five bishops with their crosses — London, Durham, Lincoln, Ely, Chichester — and lingered on Winchester a moment as he came past and up to the altar, on his long, dark round-chinned face, his full lower lip, his pleasant eyes, his curved black brows, his gorgeous mitre, his stiff jewelled vestments, his pontifical shoes.

Then Jack's eyes turned suddenly back to the left, for here came the two for whom he looked.

A great tasselled canopy moved along on four gilded staves with silver bells along its fringes, swaying and tinkling as it went, borne by four knights, and surrounded by others, up to the lower step of the altar, and there it stopped. Lord Derby stepped aside, bearing the sword of state, came towards Jack, wheeled and stood still; on the further side Lord Pembroke imitated him; the group dispersed, breaking the line of vision for a moment; the canopy moved off; and Jack could see clearly.

Two figures kneeled there on the step, gorgeous even to the courtier's eyes. Nearest him was the woman whose heart he thought he knew, in her brocade robe and satin kir tie, alight with diamonds on head and breast,

The Queen's Tragedy her long train streaming from her shoulders three yards behind, a scarlet shoe just visible beneath it. She bore a taper in her hand, and her face was downcast. Jack could see her lips moving gently as she prayed. Beyond her knelt her husband, bare-headed in the presence of the Most Holy Sacrament, he too in jewels and brocade and white satin, and with a taper in his hand; but his head was thrown back. Jack could see his yellow hair falling to his gold collar that bore the Order of the Fleece. Behind the Queen stood Lord Winchester and Master Gage, who had borne her train, and behind them again the shining troop of ladies — the peeresses, Lady Margaret Clifford, Lady Magdalene Dacre, on whom his eyes rested a moment, Mistress Shirley and the rest. Beyond those the company of the Spanish nobles — the Duke of Alva, Don Cesar de Gonzaga, the Marquis de las Navas, and others, whom he already knew by sight, a squadron of gorgeous splendour behind the Prince.

The Gloria Patri, sung by the full choirs of the Cathedral and the Queen's Chapel, began to a bowing of heads; and the two kneeling figures rose together, adored, bowed one to the other, and separated each to a traverse. Mary turned slowly to her right, and for a moment faced Jack Norris; then she passed on and disappeared round the corner of the traverse near which he stood, to go up to her seat.

But what he had seen held him so much astonished that he forgot to bow. He had expected dignity, magnificence and a rigid face, above all at this moment; but he had seen instead a passionate lover. Her face was flushed beneath her white coif, her lips parted and trembling, her dark eyes incredibly soft and ardent with love and tears. He had seen the great diamond on her breast rise and fall with her sobbing breath, and the swift look that she gave, as she turned, to her clasped hands

Mary the Queen takes a Husband on one of which, Jack knew, lay among her jewels the gold ring that made her wife.

The nuptial mass began; but he saw little of it. That radiant face was before him still; those eyes shallow and reserved no longer; those stiff sullen lips broken into curves of tenderness. Did she then feel all that, for that gay spark opposite? Jack stared across at him; the Prince was kneeling in his seat; and over the screen of gold arras looked out that pear-shaped face, broad at the brows, narrow at the bearded chin; but his eyes were downcast in solemn devotion, and the cloth-of-silver edge of his great missal peeped over the line of the bookboard. Beneath and on either side stood the stately Spanish nobles, scarcely less gorgeous than their master, in white satin trunks, gold-clasped cloaks and great ruffs that seemed to support their dark faces as in plates of gauze and pearls.

Once more Jack remembered the Prince's reputation, and for an instant pity touched him for that woman, past her youth, bat not past passion. If it had been Magdalene Dacre now!

He saw her again presently as she moved out after the gospel to meet her husband and kneel once more side by side with him on the step; but this time he could see no more than her profile; and as she knelt all view was shut out by the nobles who held the care-cloth over the heads of the two.

At the altar the splendid movement went on; the Passion of Christ re-enacted itself in glorious drama, staged on the high carpeted footpace and interpreted by the gemmed figures of the three bishops who came and went and moved their hands and bowed their heads to tell the ineffable mystery; but the usher's eyes turned

The Queen's Tragedy again and again to the curving line of the care-cloth between which Mary knelt beside her Prince.

A profound silence fell as the celebrant leaned forward with elbows on the altar and the white disc between his fingers; and when the few words were said, and the bell told to the crowds within and without that the Saviour of the world was come again to His own, from end to end the Cathedral murmured with sound as the worshippers relaxed their attitudes and kneeled back once more.

There was a soft chord on the organ presently; silence; a chord again, and with it a boy's voice began in deep contralto, inexpressibly moving.

" Agnus Dei," pealed the sexless voice — " O Lamb of God, that takest away the sins of the world."

Jack craned his head in desperate desire to see Tom. — Ah! what a voice that was! He had only heard it boarded rooms hitherto. Then he forgot; and abruptly turned his eyes back to the little human and divine drama of the kiss of peace. The Prince went up the steps and received it from Stephen Gardiner, returning again with stately and deliberate gait to where his wife waited to receive the kiss from him.

Jack was kneeling; but he saw the care-cloth rise for a moment as Mary stood up, and then sink again a few inches as the kiss was given and the two went on to their knees once more.

Ten minutes later all was done; the celebrant had given the final benediction; the last gospel was read, and the hallowed sops and wine had been administered from a gold plate and cup to the two beneath the care-cloth.

Then as the canopy moved forward from the north to receive them, borne now by seven knights, the herald

Mary the Queen takes a Husband stepped forward in his tabard to announce the titles of the royal pair.

His voice pealed out the sonorous words, and the murmuring crowds hushed to hear the glorious arrogance:

Philippus et Maria, Dei gratia Rex et Regina Angliae, Franciae, Neafiolis, Hierusalem... Fidei defensores.... Principes Hispaniarum et Siciliae.... Flandriae et Tyrolis...."

Then once more in English, that all might understand what had been done that day; how protesting kingdoms and states were claimed now under a single sceptre, and that the sceptre they would see presently pass down the nave on its red cushion; how the two mightiest powers of the world had clasped hands and kissed each other and would go out presently beneath one canopy to begin their journey of love and conquest side by side.

" Philip and Mary," cried the herald, " by the Grace of God King and Queen of England, France, Naplesjerusalem and Ireland; Defenders of the Faith; King and Queen of Spain, Sicily, Leon and Arragon; Archdukes of Austria, Dukes of Milan, Burgundy and Brabant, Counts of Hasborough, Flanders and Tyrol; Lords of the islands of Sardinia, Majorca, Minorca, of the Firmland and the great ocean Sea; Palatines of Hainault and the Holy Empire, Lords of Friesland and Ireland, Governors of all Asia and Africa."

Jack's heart quickened as he heard it, and he felt really serious for the first time. This then was the beginning of peace; England and Spain were one, and the Vicar of Christ had sanctioned the union. In a few months his Legate would be here, and the reconciliation sealed. It was not possible that such a triumphant beginning could have any but a happy ending, if not for the Queen, at least for her kingdom.

The Queen's Tragedy

Jack stepped from his place as the tinkling canopy moved off, and Guy Manton came forward to meet him; and, after a pause while those nearest the royal couple took their positions and wheeled westwards, the two ushers met, adored together and turned too.

It was an amazing procession.

Far in f ont moved the canopy with its tassels and bells swinging and the long lines of heads following; and as it came out under the rood screen from the shadowy choir into the white nave a tumult of cheering rose to meet it, drowning the cry of the trumpets that went before, the melodious thunder overhead and the pealing organs.

The great west doors were open wide, and the daylight poured in through them and the huge coloured window upon the crowned heads on either side of the raised way along which the pageant went; and from among these rose a forest of waving hands and tossed caps to acclaim what had been done that day. There was little doubt what Hampshire folk thought, in the visible presence of splendour and strength; and they expressed it by roaring.

It was not until they had passed through the cloisters between the lines of guards, leaving the surging mob behind them at the west-end of the Cathedral, had crossed the little stream between the planes, and come through the court of the Palace into the hall already hung and decked for the afternoon banquet, that Jack spoke to the man who had walked beside him in silence.

" Well? " he said; and then, — " Tom sang Agnus Dei well."

" Yes," said Guy.

Hie pusillus ac degener, qui... cmendare mavuli deos quam se. Sen. Epist.